I'm a contributing editor to Forbes Magazine, where I write about games and technology. My book Of Dice and Men: The Story of Dungeons & Dragons and The People Who Play It is a history of one of the most important games of our time.
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Valve's Gabe Newell Is The Newest Video Game Billionaire

Gabe Newell, co-founder and managing director of Valve Corporation, is one of the richest people on the planet. With an estimated net worth of $1.5 billion dollars, he ranks 854th out of 1,226 global billionaires.

Valve Corporation's Gabe Newell

One of the most respected figures in the video game business, Newell makes his debut on Forbes’ list of the world’s billionaires after Valve posted a stellar 2011. The Bellevue, Wash. software firm scored hits both as game developer (Portal 2 was a monster hit) and game distributor (digital distribution platform Steam doubled sales for the seventh straight year, and has over 40 million users).

Newell, 49, owns more than 50% of privately-held Valve, which he co-founded in 1996 after cashing in stock options earned over a decade producing software for Microsoft.

Privately-held Valve Corporation is tight-lipped about revenues, and Newell doesn’t comment on his personal finances. So in order to estimate his net worth, Forbes consulted with video game industry insiders, equity analysts, investment bankers, and technology analysts to figure out what the company is worth. Even the most conservative estimates put Valve’s enterprise value at more than $3 billion, and since Newell owns more than 50% of the company, that means he’s worth at least $1.5 billion.

Valve is unlike any company in the video game business. More than half of their revenues come from selling downloadable games over Steam, which has dominated the digital sales channel since 2003, when it started as a platform for the company’s own games. In the years since, lack of competition allowed it to seize as much as 70% of the market: Today, Steam features in excess of 1,800 games from more than 50 different publishers.

It’s far and away the industry’s most important digital sales channel, and no other game company has a comparable service. Last summer, video game giant Electronic Arts launched a counter-offensive, and its Origin service expanded quickly thanks to EA’s industry connections, and platform exclusives like Star Wars: The Old Republic. But Steam still has over 40 million users, compared to 9.3 million on Origin.

The rest of Valve’s revenues come from publishing original games. Valve only launches a few games a year, but they tend to be hits: 2011′s Portal 2 is widely regarded as one of the best games of the year.

This is the 25th annual edition of Forbes list of The World’s Billionaires. Our first cut yielded 140 names. This year we’ve counted an all-time high 1,226 billionaires worth a record $4.6 trillion. It includes 128 new billionaires, from 32 countries.

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Difficult to understand a company not meeting its customers, fans in the world ask for Hal Life 3. only with this action could become the 1st list and help people in need or if do not like money deposited in my account